In Excess

Tales From the Golden Age of Self-Indulgence

It hasn't been a very good year for all-out,
bathe-yourself-in-spring-water-and-diamonds excess—so we applaud you for cutting back on the gold-dust
facials and caviar toothpaste. (We know it was tough.)

But if you've found yourself feeling nostalgic for the bubbly indulgences of yore, we understand. And if
you've already started plotting your first post-post-crash bit of setting money on fire…

Well, that's where Megalomania: Too Much Is Never Enough comes in. It's an illustrated tribute to
history's most glorious excesses, from Dubai's half-mile skyscrapers to Moscow's diamond-encrusted
Benzes—and just the inspirational tome you need for your recovery-era shenanigans.

Whether it's a dam on the Nile or Russ Meyer's spectacularly stacked leading ladies, the quest for
self-glorification has produced some pretty fantastic results—and some pretty fantastic photographs
too. As a result, you'll have 144 pages of abandoned Bavarian castles and outsized Napoleonic processions,
not to mention Federer and Agassi facing off 700 feet above Dubai—all for the greater glory of whoever
picked up that particular tab.

And when you inevitably start on your own monument, you can draw on the megalomaniacal wisdom of the
pharaohs and the Easter Islanders—both of whom managed to pull off the "immortalization" shtick
without seeming tacky—and learn a few well moneyed poses from vintage snaps of Howard Hughes, Muhammad
Ali and Superman.